Victorian

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Victorian
GENERAL
Frankenstein
The Picture of Dorian Gray
Penny Dreadful
Character	Victor Frankenstein
Character	Dorian Gray
Canonical?	Fanon
Status of Relationship	Never Met Allies, Former Enemies (Penny Dreadful)
IN FANDOM
Type (?)	Slash

Victorian is the slash ship between Victor Frankenstein and Dorian Gray from the Frankenstein, The Picture of Dorian Gray and Penny Dreadful fandoms.

Canon

Victor Frankenstein and Dorian Gray are both the titular anti-heroes of Victorian-era Gothic Horror novels. In both stories, they had tried to break the rules of human nature, Frankenstein wanted to bring the dead to life again, Dorian Gray wished that a portrait in his likeness shall age instead of him. In both cases, they try to keep those a secret from their loved ones, only confessing the truth to one person each. Both of their stories end with their deaths, technically both die at the hands of their own creations.

Penny Dreadful

The entire first season has Victor and Dorian never cross paths, despite sharing a notable number of main characters in their social circle. This is mostly because Victor is a reclusive scientist working for Sir Malcolm Murray, while Dorian is an aristocrat who only had sparse contact with Murray.

Finally in the second season, the two men meet for the first time when Dorian is visiting their mutual friend Vanessa Ives, intending to invite her and Sir Malcolm to a "coming-out" party for his current girlfriend Angelique. Vanessa introduces Victor to Dorian, who immediately tries to get on Victor's good graces by complimenting his appearance. Before leaving after giving her a personal invitation, Dorian tells Victor that he must come as well. Victor later tells his most-recent creation Lily about the ball and intends to have her as his plus one. Though when Victor introduces Lily to Dorian, he notably gets jealous when Lily shows attraction towards Dorian (her former identity, Brona Croft, was one of his past lovers). Though he gives Dorian permission to dance with her and later allows Lily to run after Dorian when she wants to see him again, he eventually gets consumed by jealousy and tries to get Lily back by force in the season finale. However, when seeing Dorian dance with Lily, he realizes that Lily had gone mad and shoots her in the heart. When nothing happens, Victor shoots Dorian as well, but Dorian just smiles and mocks him as Lily explains that she and Dorian see the rest of humanity as beneath them, intending to create a race of immortals together. Victor angrily storms out as Lily and Dorian resume dancing, even as their blood starts to coat the floor.

Fanon

Victorian was already a popular ship in the first season, largely because the build-in fanbases of both characters and many couldn't wait to see them finally interact. Some even hoped that Dorian would become one of Victor's love interests, especially it was revealed that this version of Dorian is indeed attracted to men. Though it took a hit after their interactions ended on an antagonistic note in the second season, them burying the hatchet later in the third season brought it back stronger than ever. It is currently the ninth-most popular ship for the series overall, as well as the second-most popular ship for both characters within context of the series.

Though fanfics shipping their book counterparts only started appearing after the series was released, they do exist.

Fandom

FAN FICTION

Victor/Dorian tag on AO3